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Topic: Russian Systema (Read 46731 times)

This is something I have been working with for about two years now. My company markets a DVD and eBook Series done by a former Russian Olympian who then ended up in the KGB until the Soviet Union broke up. When I saw it on tape the first time I didn't want the project it looked fake. Then I met Val, he tapped me in the stomach and I though I was gonna die, seriously.

This video starts out with me explaining why it works, hope you guys enjoy it.

That looks pretty interesting, I am going to play with that on my heavy bag at home. Thanks for the idea.

I have friends that have "played" with George Dillman and they do not think very highly of Mr. Dillman. What you have on the video looks much more substantial and physics based. I think one of the Chinese systems has a technique called "iron palm" that was based on a whip using the mass of the hand. One of my former training partners used to break patio blocks using something that looked very similar to the technique on your video clip.

My background is more on the jujitsu side but I started out in the Korean (Tang Soo Do) arts. But it seems lately that I spend most of my time training Glockfu.

230therapy

What's funny is that the Washington DC Systema guys came to one of the seminars. They had been doing things...in a slack way. Sonny solved that problem..brutally. Apparently, they're now back on track.

Ok, before you guys start flaming me about how awful of a parent I am, be forewarned!

Jack's point about even a little kid hitting hard got me to thinking. (Warning: Jack had nothing to do with this, I take full personal responsibility!)

I have a 7 year old at home who has 2 older brothers. They are great kids (really, they are), and we like to wrestle in a fun sort of way, but sometimes that little guy does not know his own strength! While he is 7 he is small for his age, so I thought he would be the perfect guy to try this on.

I made sure he was relaxed in the arms, and had him just slug me in the chest with just his arm being totally relaxed.

The first few slugs he was really tight, trying to power through it. Barely felt it, even though he was really slugging me. The more he relaxed, the harder the blow. He finally figured it out, and WHAM!. If I think about it, it still hurts! Not just a hit your hand with a hammer sort of pain, but a reverberating throbbing swelling sort of pain through my whole chest. If he was aiming for a vital area I'm not sure what would have happened.

There might be something to this stuff. Yes, I did give him the lecture of how there is a difference between wrestling in fun, and trying to hurt someone.

But knowing how much that hurt from him, i can't imagine how it feels when a grown man does it full power. If a kid could be trained responsibly, it would really put the hurt on some bad guy trying to kidnap or worse. Like I said, don't try that at home. I did downplay the pain to him, and if I thought for a second that he would use it irresponsibly I'd have never have tried it. Also, it took alot of me wiggling his arm to get him to relax just right so I doubt he has the muscle memory to replicate that blow again without alot of coaching and time spent. I will definitely be checking out systema....

1. Just sit in a chair and use your fist like a hammer and hammer your thy, using the bottom of your fist. Keep stiff like a normal punch, start soft and work up until you begin to have a bit of pain on impact. It may take a while to get enough power to really go yea that sort of hurts. Take your time go slow don't injure yourself!

2. Now let your arms hang at your sides, totally relax them. Now raise your hand over your thy and don't even make a fist, just drop it as dead weight allowing the side of your hand to do the impact. Almost like a "chop" but just let gravity do its thing. Do this a few times, don't expect much you are just learning to let go.

3. Now "assist gravity" by just putting in some effort just a bit and about half way allow gravity to take back over.

4. Begin to provide more assistance and a bit more guidance and control on the decent. Think like you are swinging a hammer with your hand as the hammers head. Keep increasing the effort a little at a time but stay totally loose and always "let go" of effort on the decent, just like a hammer.

In a very short time your hand will begin to land on your leg with a LOT of weight and a dead blow type of impact. This won't make you ready to deploy this type of strike but it will begin to put you in touch with things.

You have to be very careful with doing this with others and hitting other people. After about a week of doing this I told my partner Neil (the guy getting beaten in the videos) I "had it". Neil is a 25 year martial artist and I have watched very big guys punch him and just stand there taking it in the chest stomach etc. He says, go ahead and taps his upper chest. I let him have a pretty good one and he says, "your holding back". I was like of course I am he says no, do it for real. I dropped the hammer, I heard the air blow out of his left lung, he fell to the ground, damaged his knee from the impact and could honestly not get up for about 5 minutes.

He has not asked me to do that ever again

What I want to be clear about is our videos (if anyone wants to buy them) teach you to strike and not much more. A bit on movement, etc but Systema is a compete art and to really learn you will need to find an instructor. Training is tough at times and really easy and relaxed at others. Much is learning the body and how it moves. There are no forms, katas, rank systems, etc. You can honestly learn what you need in 6 months of real instruction and the art itself requires you to do with it as you please and evolve it to your own needs and life.

You will see videos of guys softly punching each other, moving around, etc. Why? Your mind does not know the difference of fast and slow, do it slow over and over and in time you just know how to react to what comes.

I have focused on the striking because it is what I enjoy most learning. The key is being able to strike from any position, hide your strike until you land it and never show what you know until you need it. Competitive fighters can use this stuff etc but at the core Systema is designed to be a concealed weapon.

At one time I saw a boxing stance as a fighting stance. Now a fighting stance is scratching your right ear, left hand hanging in your left pocket and paying attention to what is going on. Much of Systema is disarming your opponent with calm and then applying SUFFICIENT not excessive force when that fails.

Oh and yea like Iron Palm and other eastern techniques do use these principals. They key is they are closely guarded secrets a student must study for ages to be trusted with. Something masters share with new masters. This is why I love Systema from the day I met Val he just told me how to do anything I asked about. The Russian people (including the military types) have been anything but what I had expected. To think that this man and I were trained to kill each other during the "cold war" is quite disturbing to me.

I've watched all the video's I can find on this so far, Are there any other resources for learning it without buying the DVD set? I wouldn't mind buying it, but the boss has had a hard enough time with the money I have wanted to spend on preps in the past. We both have our CHL and she isn't blind to stuff around her, but I would really like to learn and also teach her and my two kids. Apparently I am video challenged in that I can't seem to pick it up from the clips I saw on youtube..

Thanks Jack, for the podcast and everything else. I found you a month or so ago and have listened to all podcasts now, a few more than once. I am in the wylie area, so we are really not all that far apart in Texas terms.

Where can I find an instructor in Michigan for this system? Also, where can we get the videos?

Also, I concur with the above acknowledgment of thanks for this site and podcast. I'm not generally a fanatic about anything but I can't stop telling people about how they have to listen to this. Thanks Jack.

Watching the guy doing "normal" punches, you can imagine he'd get tired out really quickly. By using the Systema method, it seems like you could almost go all day because there's very little energy expended (or did I just imagine that?).

I took the Level 4 Security training (Personal Protective Officer aka Bodyguard) here in Texas after college. Never did anything with it, but in the training, our instructor was about 5'2", WELL-trained. Ground fighting was my favorite, actually. My longer reach proved really effective. I managed to get him with a kick (he had a pad in front) and sent him flying. It was a lucky shot, but I think he had a reality check on our mass differences. =-]

I'd like to do something like this. I had considered Krav Maga as I know some people who do it. I may have to give it a try.

Colorado Springs does not seem like a good place for this. The local Krav Maga school is a TKD and Karate school first. I'm not sure I trust that. The closest Systema instuctor is in Longmont, pretty far away. Possible when I get done with my degree I'll move near the Denver metro area.

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Debo

As much as I hate to, in the spirit of open discussion and opposing viewpoints, I have got to call this bunk. Punching someone who is expecting it and clenching his stomach doesn't work as well as suprising them with a sucker punch. No shit. That is about the only thing really demonstrated in this video and we already knew it and it is regardless of what style of H2H you use. Also, there is no "aliveness" in the training. Nobody is fighting back. Try to hit him with your "15# hammer" when the guy has you clinched and is punching you in the face. Try to hit him with your "15# hammer" when he is behind you and choking you from a back mount. I would rather hit him with my whole 212# body by going ahead and attaching it to my fist. When professional fighters start winning matches with Systema magic or when I need to sucker punch a relaxed un-suspecting bystander I might be a convert. Until then, I am going to keep training with a gun, western boxing, FMA, Muay Thai, and free-style wrestling/bjj while still HOPING that I am well rounded enough to survive the unfortunate event when I would have to employ it.

Don't get me started on the knife defense. For future reference- A good test? Put a red marker in the hand of a teenage girl, tell her she gets $10 for every mark she puts on you, and then see how real your knife defense is. She will probably giggle all the way to the mall and you, like me, will be left analyzing your game.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=51UHJW7XJAw&feature=related

"You are attacking me wrong." Have you ever heard this? This is a great comedic illustration of the point of aliveness in training. As soon as opponents become absolutely predictable we will all be better off.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T2u1GKJ3csE

FWIW, if you don't have to wear a mouthpiece your training isn't really alive and I would hesitate to depend on it in a real fight. Bruce Lee knew this. That is why he was one of the first ones ever to champion the use of martial arts in the ring. Before Bruce and his common sense most strikes were deemed too "deadly" to be used on a real person. Remember the first couple of UFC fights when the exotic and deadly asian BS arts went down to a scrappy 170# dude from Brazil? Grappling arts mopped the floor with everything until people learned takedown defense and grappling. You HAVE to be well rounded. Constantly evolve. Fighting is not an art. Painting and sculpture are arts and essentially unchanged in 500 years. Fighting is TECHNOLOGY and technology evolves and is constantly being refined. What worked in fuedal Japan 300 years ago might not work as well now. Also beware of scripted attacks in your training. The most scripted we ever got was watching videos of street fights that happen outside of clubs and realizing that a large majority of first punches in a fight are looping overhand rights (caveman punches) that hope to end the fight in one knockout. We worked on expecting the probability of these punches and getting inside of them and going to work. Now does this mean that I shouldn't also constantly work on parrying a jab or defending against a takedown? You know the answer to that.

Systema in its true original form probably has some validity. This is not, however, what guys like this are peddling to you guys. Hate to be the one to disagree with ya'll so please refrain from shooting the messenger.

I am so ever loving sick of this type of response to Systema. Now unlike most I PUT MY MONEY where my mouth is. Val is coming in from the UAE in March to shoot some more film with us.

Get on a plane, come here, stand toe to toe with Val, prove it is "bunk" and I will pay you 5,000 Dollars in cash from my own pocket.

There is nothing more for me to say then that, nor should I have to give what I am willing to offer. Again I am just sick of this, seriously. Those that have never experienced something like this just bash it, come on down, prove what you say or be open to being wrong. I'll put up my 5K, you up for it, or are you just talkin?

And YES I am absolutely 100% serious here. Don't bother saying anything much in response unless you plan on booking a ticket to DFW Airport,

Jack, unless you have already thought of it, you are missing a tremendous money making and training opportunity. Have you considered teaming up with a few of the local martial arts studio and having a seminar while he is in town? You could even take orders to purchase the DVDs are the seminar. Maybe even offer a TSP discount

I try to keep my commercial efforts as far from TSP as I can. On a few occasions I mention my business or show a product that I think listeners will enjoy. I do TSP mostly to share my views with the survival community and help it grow. Hence much of what we do promotionally with FS Media is not visible to the audience.

We are actually about to do a 4-6 part series of Systema/Sambo/KBG techniques. Some of this is martial arts, some is street fighting and some practical weapons use. All from the Russian mind set. I am going to be looking for some local martial artists to appear in the videos, if you know any in DFW that might have an interest let me know.

As for teaming up with schools, etc. The issue is that Neil is actually very involved in running several companies and simply could never find the time. I simply am not skilled enough to teach anything beyond the basic striking which is just not enough to go into a school with. Val is currently living in the UAE (United Arab Emirates) doing specialized consulting and training for their security forces. He really doesn't want to move the the US full time either. So that is a problem for us in going this route.

In the future who knows, perhaps there will be an annual TSP get together with seminars etc. I am sure I could arrange Val to conduct several. I assure you the way the KGB train in shooting is nothing like you ever see here in the US.

I am looking forward to your systema demonstration at the Region 3 get together. will you be selling systema videos at a discount possibly? The KGB shooting style sounds intriguing. (possible show topic? or even separate video?) can you post a link to your systema videos? Thanks for all you do.

I am looking forward to your Systema demonstration at the Region 3 get together. will you be selling systema videos at a discount possibly? The KGB shooting style sounds intriguing. (possible show topic? or even separate video?) can you post a link to your systema videos? Thanks for all you do.

Here is a link to a free eBook by Neil, http://valriazanov.com/myjourney.html When you request it you get a special offer. I don't think I will be selling vids at the shindig, they can always be ordered online. Val will be here in March and we are doing a new series with a lot more content on how to do everything from more on strikes, to weapon disarms, to some grappling and more. I don't know if they will be available by the time of the get together it takes a lot longer to get a DVD from raw footage to production then most people realize.

One thing I want to make clear is my training will be some very basics. I have been asked to teach here at some schools and have always declined. I am no expert on Systema I do know how to deliver the strikes, the basics of movement and the philosophy of concealment. That is all I feel qualified to cover. I am sure a full week with Val though just a month before the get together will really help and perhaps add a few new things I can cover.

I would love that but he is actually in the UAE as a consultant/trainer for their security forces on a long term contract. Add to that he is a Ukrainian citizen and getting him here for the next round of filming has been tough. I don't think I can get him back over again very soon, He is an amazing guy, I sure wish I could get him to move to the US permanently. Yet with a KGB background, that is well, difficult.